Chapter 27: A Half-Baked Plan
[Lance's POV:]
'Furious' didn't even begin to summarize how I felt, but it scratched the surface. Several emotions welled up inside me upon having seen the televised message Joker made for me, but chief among them aside from my rage, was fear. What in the world was going to happen to Jeanette? Was the Joker actually going to let her go completely free if I showed up with the money? How could I trust that he would? And on top of all that, it was at least six in the evening; how in God's name did that deranged lunatic think I was going to pull a million dollars from my accounts at this hour?
"It's a trap." I mumbled as I sat down at the counter, steepling my fingers.
"Figured that was probably the case," Eva said, leaning on her elbows on the counter, "But why do you say that?"
"The only way I'll be able to muster a million before midnight is through illegal means." I replied, frowning down at the counter. "I can't go to the police for help to make the ransom, or Jeanette is forfeit. I cannot simply arrive empty-handed without a means for ransom or bargaining, or Jeanette is forfeit."
"So you'd have to rob a bank or illegally draw out funds from like, savings bonds or stocks or whatever," Robert jumped in, "And you won't do that."
"Of course I won't." I said, perhaps a touch irritably.
"So what are we going to do?" Eva asked. To that, I didn't have an immediate answer, and so silence descended upon the kitchen, tense and unyielding. Every tick of the clock set my nerves on edge, ringing in my ears louder and louder.
"Lance calm down, man!" Robert said in sudden alarm. "You're starting to shift!"
I glanced down at my hands and realized with a start that they were beginning to lengthen and sprout long black fur at an alarming rate. A second later, I felt my ears twitch, much larger and longer than human ears should be. I inhaled deeply, held my breath a moment, and then exhaled. A second later, and my tail may have emerged as well. My two friends maintained their gazes upon me as I continued to breathe deeply, until I had reverted my shifting and restored myself to a general calm. Or rather, as calm as I could manage to be, given the circumstances.
"My gratitude to you both," I murmured.
"Anytime." They answered in relative tandem.
Silence continued to build, when without warning, something occurred to me.
"Hold on a moment," I said, rising from my seat, "I think I may have an idea."
"What is it?" Eva raised a curious eyebrow.
"Something utterly insane and possibly suicidal," I replied, looking sharply to Robert, who jumped, "Rob, you have a tendency to follow all of those crime-drama shows more than the news, don't you?"
He gave me a skeptical look.
"Yes," he answered slowly, "Mostly so I can see whether or not the people who make those dumb series are actually ever getting their crap right."
"How often does a situation like this arise, in those shows?"
"Like every episode."
"Right! And when the situation becomes like this one, where someone's hands are all but tied completely, how do they solve it?" I pressed him.
He shrugged and replied, "Usually by pulling a fast one on the—"He stopped abruptly, and I watched the comprehension dawn on his face, "Wait a mother-freaking second, are you saying you want to con the Joker?!"
"It may be our only shot." I answered.
"You want to con the Joker?" Eva asked, clearly impressed with my slowly-deteriorating sound mind. She clapped a hand on my shoulder, giving me a small, genial shake. "I'm proud of you, soft-paws. Maybe there's hope for you yet."
"Don't get me wrong, so am I," Robert said, a touch thickly, as his fangs had extended in his growing anxiety, "But this is the Joker, Lance."
"I did say the idea was possibly suicidal." I reminded him. "But it may be the only chance we have to save Jeanette. If you don't want to risk it, I understand. But if you're willing…are you two still with me?"
There was a pause as they both hesitated, thinking hard, but after a moment, they nodded. I exhaled a sigh of relief I hadn't realized I'd been holding in. The idea was definitely insane, but the knowledge that my two friends, those two who were practically family, would be helping me with it, made it seem far less daunting. With them, it would be in reach, and I would have a much better chance of saving Miss Harker.
Jeanette, a small voice in my head corrected me, and I tried my best to avoid blushing.
"Alright, excellent! Gerard seems to have disappeared after bringing to you the kitchen, Eva, but I daresay we'll need him. He needs to play the part of a distraction. Robert, you're going to help me set up the prop we need. And Eva?"
She raised her eyebrows at me to show she was listening and ready to help. I gritted my teeth together, knowing she wasn't going to like what I said next.
"Gerard is known as my employee, and Robert is known as my friend and associate of sorts. But you are an unknown. I'm going to need you to go in disguise to the police department and deliver them a message."
Roughly an hour and a half later, I was pacing up and down in the lobby of my office building, while Rook made a scene of prowling around the main desk in open view of the windows and glass doors. It felt as though time was slipping away from us like water passing through a sieve, my nerves were fraying with every passing second and each glance outside caused my stomach to clench. Eva hadn't been exaggerating in her claims about the sky looking unnatural, and if I strained my ears, my lycanthropic hearing caught distant snatches of sound. Sirens belonging to various vehicles were wailing, cars were flying up and down the roads at random, and sounds of panic made me want to shift into wolf form and raise my hackles in response.
"Sounds like everything's going to Hell out there," came a calm mutter from behind the main desk.
"Yes," I answered my vampire friend in a low voice as I slowed in my pacing to look out of the main doors, "Or Hell is coming to us."
"Ugh, great," Robert suddenly popped into sight again, hefting a handgun he had been pretending to look for as he started walking back, "Switch places with me."
I complied, never letting my eyes stray from the door until I got behind the desk.
"Do you see him?" I asked. "There's a man watching us from the building across the street, in one of the upper floor windows."
There was a slight pause as I ducked down to open my briefcase, then he answered, "Yeah. Yeah, I see him. He's watching me with some purple binoculars. You were right; Joker's watching to see what you do."
"Purple? Are you sure it's not eggplant?"
"Eggpl—dude, what kind of question is that?!"
I began systematically stuffing the lower compartment of the briefcase to weigh it down, and shook my head in exasperation.
"Look, just keep speaking in slow intervals," I answered, "That way you're selling the part of the oblivious look-out better."
"How do we know these guys can't read lips?"
"Call it a hunch, Robert. Just keep talking. Say something. Anything."
He paused again, then said, "So…you're really scared for Jeanette, aren't you?"
I fumbled with the upper compartment before I got it situated into the briefcase.
"Yes." I finally replied, feeling my face burn red.
"Lance?" He said, and I stood up over the top of the desk enough so I could be seen with the briefcase through the windows. "Are you…serious about her?"
"Yes," I answered, and it truly hit me for the first time that I meant it with all of my being, "I am more serious about Jeanette and the relationship I hope to have with her than I am a good many things in my life."
I shut the briefcase, closing its latches with a snap, aware of my friend's gray eyes following my progress.
"She's a great girl, bro."
I glanced up at him and smiled wearily.
"Yes. She is." I agreed quietly.
My cell phone vibrated abruptly in my coat pocket, jarring us both, and Rook shifted his grip on the handgun as I pulled the phone out to read the text.
"Gerard's made sure he's been seen making 'withdrawals' from several ATMs." I said with a ragged sigh. "Now all that's left is to send Eva the details of where we're heading, regroup with Gerard, and head to the address we were sent."
"I'm telling you, Lance, the chances of this working are zilch to zip to nada to Hell-in-a-hand basket." Rook muttered as he led the way out of the front doors.
"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Robert." I muttered, but the pessimistic thoughts lurking in the back of my mind silently agreed with him. It would take a miracle of God's own design for this plan to work even slightly.
But Jeanette was in danger and regrettably, I had no other choice.